10D DSLR vs a 35mm film system

In adopting new technology it could be said that there are 5 major groups:

Innovators - impulsive, like what is new and fun, invest in time to learn, very technically literate, like to be the first to own and then move on to next;
Early adopters - like new things, study available information before investing, technically literate;
Early majority - like to be on-trend with new products, have good knowledge but want feedback from first adopters before investing;
Late majority - uninterested in novelty, utilitarian, dislike investing time in learning, believe innovations are hard to use, information only used if based on someone’s direct experience
Laggards - information form interpersonal communication only

This article is aimed at the "Late Majority" and the "Laggards".

Summary of findings

index

background
testing premise and assumptions
what I did
known deficiencies in the testing procedures
the result images
my take on the findings

Put simply, my findings from this test are that there is not much in it, certainly not the 'chalk and cheese' people would have you believe.

The DSLR is significantly better in shadows
The 35mm film system gives slightly more detail, and much better handling of over exposure and highlights.

So, to the film "laggards" I say if you're happy there then there's no rush to move.
To the digital "Innovators" in the wholistic systems analysis its not as clear as you'd like it to be.

Note: as a result of this test I'm now of the inclination that I will no longer use positive (or slide film) as the results from modern negative films show as much detail (more on my equipment in fact) and you using negative gives substantial highlight responces in bright contrasty lighting. Using slide I can not take advantage of the wide contrast range that negative offers. If you were successful with chromes in the past, then definately using a DSLR in RAW will give as good (or perhaps better) images

So, if you already have a 35mm film SLR system that you are using non-professionally and you have an existing stockpile of exposed film, then you can make your move into digital cheaper by getting a good compact (good for many uses) and perhaps upgrade your scanner if its not already good.

Otherwise, if you fit into any of these:

wishing to become a working professional
have no good camera and are thinking about an SLR camera

then go get a DSLR of any size and nature because the results are so close that you'd be shooting your self in the foot to use film.

You'll get superior detail in the shadows and using RAW combined with careful exposure control you can get results that in the main will be often superior to film. Plus you'll save time with enhanced workflows and thus save money.

If you are a landscape photographer, consider using 'stitching' techniques rather than buying super wide lenses, you will have access to splendid post processing tools and you'll definitely exceed the results you can obtain from 35mm film even with a compact.

Background

I started into digital photography by scanning film in around 1996 with a Nikon Coolscan 1000. My first digital camera was not until 2000. I owned early Coolpix "swivel body" cameras many digital cameras since that time. For quite a few years I felt that it was not economic to buy a DSLR, remembering that these things cost thousands of dollars until as recently as 2005.

My appraisal of the DSLR market was that it held no significant advantage to me over the combined use of 5 megapixel "pro-sumer" compact and my existing 35mm film camera and scanning that film. Especially since I am a hobby photographer, and one with a greater inclination to photograph wider angle landscapes rather than telephoto subjects such as sports and birds. This last point is really where the DSLR is weakest, and it was not untill the very cost effective 18-55mm range of zooms appeared that the wide end of the DSLR range could be satisfied without spending even more thousands on lenses.

I had done some research, and had read a number of pages which compared cameras like the 10D with film (such as these links). They range from dubious to detailed:

this one
and this one
and one of the most detailed here.
and by the same author as above this one covers dynamic range.

To me the results looked close, and many advantages of DSLR did not translate to any advantage to me. There was a good discussion on this topic on photo.net which seemed to me to have me comfortable that there really wasn't much in it.

NOTE: Finally (after assembling and publishing this page) I found this detailed and thorough review, I don't know if I had read it would I have bothered with this, but it is essentially the most definitive analysis of this question. This study addresses well the most significant of questions such as:

are scanners obtaining all the detail present in a film (I found they weren't)
tests did not optimise the exposure for negative or focused only on slides thus biasing the experiment for the DSLR
explores dynamic range for negative differently (and perhaps more effectively)

Definately its worth examining that review.

Premise

My feeling at the beginning of my test was that anything over 2700dpi scans of 35mm film were going to be very close to what a digital SLR camera could yeild. I expected film to even perhaps exceed it in specific situations. Accordingly I expected to see the results being close. I was going to have to lug around the weight of an SLR system, that I didn't need to be forking out an extra $2000 for the priveledge of calling it a digital one.

I had owned both film and digital SLR (as well as Large Format) for some time, but had not done a side by side comparison till this time. Meaning my impressions were subjective, comparing different scenes and different situations. I wanted to make a clear examination of these systems from the perspective of all these issues. So the following factors are significant in my examination:

quality of image
economy (how much does it cost, what are the benefits
weight (I often backpack with the system)

Looking at point 2 and 3:

2: Economy

Since a good scanner costs as much as a DSLR, so why not just get the DSLR.
Well I already had a scanner (bought in 2000) but if I did not, then one must consider your existing film storage? Do you want to access them? Others may be in the same situation as me, in already having a scanner, I personally bought my first scanner well before there even was such a tempting choice as a DSLR. Buying a better scanner for the same price as a DSLR will allow me to get better images of my existing stock of film and make better use of new images.

Crop factors & lenses: The different 'format' of the APS sized sensor works both for and against, but for me mostly against me. You see, I like wide angle lenses, so unless I spend more money and get a full frame model, the more cost effective DSLR will also require me to buy wider lenses. I can get one with the cheap 18-55 zooms, but having used them and compared with the EF24 f2.8 they are lower in quality, and poorer in construction. Essentially I also have to factor in spending more money and getting another lens.

The recent devaluation of equipment has meant that good second hand (and indeed new) DSLR's are available for much less than $1000 (unlike as recently as 2004). The same is also true for second hand film gear too.

3: Weight

A DSLR would weigh the same as my 35mm SLR. I also have a light weight, good compact camera, which gives results that are comparable to a current low end DSLR, so here too I don't see much advantage.

Based on point 2 and 3 it seemed like buying a DSLR was just more money spent and no significant gain. So I was content to wander along using what seemed to me to be a cost effective balance of compact 5megapixel digital camera for snapshots and my 35mm film system when I needed it.

The testing

I felt that images taken with humble consumer grade negative had yeilded as good a print as I had got from my 20D. But I had not photographed much of the same things at the same time. Certainly not something that I actually wanted to print. So I thought "ok, why not verify things and test my self".

So that's what this test is, my own verification of the differences between my my 10D and my film EOS and have the findings published so that others who read it might get something out of it (or even let me know of something I missed). Though I doubt that today (Thursday, 4 October 2007) there are really anymore people going through the "should I stay film and go digital or not" self debates.

First, lets look at the problems with my test:
This is not a straightforward comparison, as the differing formats mean that obtaining matching lenses to give the same angle of view on the image is not easy for a start.

Since I (probably like you) am interested in composing a picture to appear how it pleases me rather than to optimise a test, I tried to get the framing the same and keep the lens quality high. But as you can see below, the film sourced image is that little more magnified (close in) meaning that the film will have more detail recorded on it than the 10D image.The difference is about 25%, but I'll cover that more in a minute.

So in my test I tried to get the images "framed up" in the viewfinder as well as evenly as I could. This is where I have some difficulty. If you buy a DSLR having already got a series of lenses for 35mm photography the different sized sensor will cause you some issues in making choices of lens. Personally I mainly use fixed focal length lenses rather than zooms, making it hart to frame things identically between the two cameras. I have available for the test:

EF 24 f2.8
EF 50 f1.8 (series I)
EF 35-70 f4.5 zoom (very old zoom)

While I could have chosen the EF 35-70 for the test I thought that it would be unfair to pit the not so optically hot 35-70 against the quite optically good fixed focal length lens. So I went for a choice of:

the 50mm onto the film camera
the 24mm onto the 10D

Due to the smaller sensor, this gives the 10D a lens that is the equivalent view to a 38mm lens on the film camera, which I acknowledge handicaps the 10D to a degree. An alternative approach would be to put the 50mm onto the 10D and stitch together a series of images, this would undoubtedly yeild a better image. However, somtimes that just isn't possible.

The image below is the scan of the film camera results on top of the 10D image, just hover your mouse over it to switch between the two. I used Fuji provia RDP-III 100 iso film for the test, and scanned with an older Epson 4870 flatbed scanner at 4800 dpi. This scanner is certainly not the hottest scanner on the market (even when I bought it), and scanners such as Nikons LS-4000 will do a much better job of getting details from the film. This is now a handicap for the film capture system as I am not getting the best that I potentially could from that system. I even left some dust on the scan :-)

If you hover your mouse over this image you can swap between the 10D and the film scan image, this allows you to see how each of the images look overall, and will give you a better feel for what the overall images look like, and what the differences are in magnification were.

advantages disadvantages

film: magnification on film higher (focal length is 50mm) film: less than perfect flatbed scanner used

10D: RAW conversion used 10D: image on sensor is less magnified than film image (effective focal length is 38mm)

10D: I compared it to Provia, comparing to high quality Negative would be different . Negative has better rendition of highlights and shadows this makes the 10D image better in terms of tonal ranges Film system: you can't easilly carry different films without needing more bodies

advantages	disadvantages
film: magnification on film higher (focal length is 50mm)	film: less than perfect flatbed scanner used
10D: RAW conversion used	10D: image on sensor is less magnified than film image (effective focal length is 38mm)
10D: I compared it to Provia, comparing to high quality Negative would be different . Negative has better rendition of highlights and shadows this makes the 10D image better in terms of tonal ranges	Film system: you can't easilly carry different films without needing more bodies

So, what did we get?

Well the scan of the 35mm is rather larger (of course) being 6704 x 4224 while the image from the 10D is 3072 x 2048. Accordingly I had to upscale the image from the 10D significantly to get it more or less equal in size to the 100% pixels from the film scan. This is what you'd see on close inspection if you tried to make a print the 10D as large as that from the film scan.

To my eye while there is some grain visible in the scanned film, though there is also nice cloud tones present. The film systems sourced image is much more detailed. So, while the DSLR image is "clean and noise free" its also much smaller and holds less detail. So, if you're looking at image detail, and large prints, the if your expecting to get better results from a DSLR, you just might not.

But, wait, what about the shadows

Here is where I found something unexpected. I happen to have a large amount of shadow foreground in this picture (nice coincidence ;-). Looking at the shadow detail something interesting emerges.

While my scanner does a reasonable job of getting into the deep shadows, there just isn't the detail there that the 10D image can get (even on my slide projector). The 10D has just so much better or clearer representation of what was there. So, if you're trying to recover information from the shadows, then at least with this scanner you'll be way better off with the 10D.

The 10D just hoses the film in the shadows for clarity. I've left these images as the same size (just cropped the middle out) so that you can get a feel for the scale difference that you'll get too.

The 35mm film holds perhaps slightly more absolute detail, at least in the well exposed areas of the image. Of course when it comes to the detail, in the shadows you clearly distinguish the trees in the 10D image, as well as the wooden pailings around the gum tree. Colour rendition in the shadows is also much better in the 10D. With the film image you can't quite read that sign there ,but damn you can't even tell its a sign in the 10D image!

Both do well, and both do better at different aspects of the image

The DSLR is significantly better in shadows
The 35mm film system gives slightly more detail, and much better handling of over exposure and highlights.

I am confident that comparison with a full frame DSLR will exceed the fine detail advatages that film had in this test.

This finding supports those found by others, though not a total overlap.

Rik Littlefield detailed analysis here in this review clearly demonstrates the better brightness range of film, but seems not to demonstrate that it has any better resolution.
R N Clark who also has a recent excellent exploration of what kind of shadow details you can recover from DSLR vs Film here.

DISCUSSION

The next important question is, how much of that shadow detail do you really want, and will you see detail differences in a print? That is hard to tell, I haven't spent the cash and had them printed yet. I expect that there will be a subtle loss of clarity in the big print from the 10D. Meaning that 35mm on a good day will just exceed the results from smaller APS sensor DSLR but the DSLR will give much better tonals in the shadows, combined with RAW processing might just get you a more usable image

The image from the scan will print to (subjective stuff here) 22 inches by 14 inches at 300dpi, that's a big print from humble 35mm (digital scanning and printing really makes this possible). In fact if you're willing to print the 10D image to 150dpi instead (* and I've found that you can) you'll get 20 inches 13 inches which is nearly the same. Clearly I'm not talking about 'close inspection' prints, rather than ones you'll hang on the wall and get no closer than 2 or so meters from.

So, depending on the subject photographed, the conditions and your technique there actually might not be much in it at all. Then if you compare prints made at the same printing detail (you decide if its 200, 300 or what ever your happy with) because the images are from less pixels the digital camera ones will print relatively smaller. But

As I mention in my other pages the size advantage of the 35mm film scans mean that you can then downsize the image and print at 300dpi and still make as good a print as anything other than a full frame DSLR.

The bottom line for me is that if you are wondering will you will get a benefit from moving to a digital SLR that you won't be getting a print size or print detail advantage compared with scans of 35mm film with well lit and contrasty subjects.

So if you already have a 35mm film SLR, and your not using it for making money and taking many many pictures with it, you will have to be gaining the advantage of one of the other advantages of DSLR (*such as instant feedback, convienence, time saved in scanning) to make it worth your while buying a DSLR.

My current view is that if you aren't taking action shots telephoto wildlife or sports then you should explore if a compact digital camera will do what you need. I have found that for many picture taking situations that compact digital cameras are very capable choices. They are just good versatile image making tools, especially if you work with macro. Have a read of my comparison with my Coolpix 5000 and my 10D

Lastly there are many sites out there telling you that digital capture clearly exceeds film, my findings are that its not as cut and dry. So as a balance check the results on this excellent test here which shows that digital SLR and 35mm film SLR are close, but consistently with my findings 35mm is slightly better for detail.

I hope that I've been able to provide you with some helpful information. If you are interested in making any comments or provising any feedback on this article, then you can e-mail me at I'd be glad to have a chat ...